


A Many Splendored Thing

by justbygrace



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-07
Updated: 2014-05-07
Packaged: 2018-01-23 20:45:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1578998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justbygrace/pseuds/justbygrace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Next-door neighbors prompt fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Many Splendored Thing

**Author's Note:**

> This does include a fire and I wouldn't want to trigger anyone.  
> (Title from 'Elephant Love Medley')

There are two things that everyone in the Powell Apartment Complex knows. One: the walls are so thin you can hear every single time someone gets up to use the bathroom and two: John Smith and Rose Tyler hate each other. They lived in adjoining flats and shared way too much wall space to maintain a pleasant neighborly friendship. Their sniping had gone on for so long that everyone had just kind of learned to tune it out. 

It all started shortly after Rose moved in. She was fresh from school and this was her first flat of her own; that alone wasn't quite enough to make John - a confirmed bachelor who wrote important articles for medical journals - ready to move somewhere very far away from her, but combined with the steady stream of friends and relatives (and her mother!) it definitely was. Rose had attempted to be friendly at first, but John's continual cold shoulder was enough to dampen her enthusiasm considerably and, eventually, to engage in the snide comments that John was so fond of. In fact, their daily arguments at the mail slots (where they always seemed to run into each other) was as much a part of life at Powell as the fact that the electricity went off when you plugged too many things into one outlet. 

For his part, John was certain that if Rose would only learn to keep it down (and never, ever invite her mother over again), he wouldn't mind having her as a neighbor quite so much. After the first night her then-boyfriend (a cowardly sort named Mickey Smith) had stayed over, Rose had stopped having her boyfriends spend the night. And thank god because John did not need the distraction of being up at all hours of the night listening to the youngsters get up to...that. However, just because the boyfriends didn't spend the night didn't mean there wasn't a constant parade of them - after Mickey it was Jimmy (an abusive jerk whose car got destroyed one night with no witnesses), Adam (a science snob whom John put in his place whilst taking out the trash), Jack (a playboy who hit on everyone in the building - no exceptions, much to John's chagrin), and Jake (he was gay, John would bet his life savings on it). Really, it was a miracle that John had lasted so long living next to such a parade as long as he did. He mentioned this to Rose on one occasion and she was not nearly so thankful for his neighborliness as he thought she should have been.

Rose, for her part, was half convinced that John had escaped from some long-lost colony of Puritans whose sole aim in life was to pass judgement on everyone they believed to be lesser beings (which, if John's comments were to be believed, was nearly everyone). His one redeeming attribute was his hair because it was...phenomenal; she had a few dreams where that hair featured predominately, much to her horror. Other than that, well, Rose had frequent daydreams in which he suddenly moved away to Antarctica and was never seen in Powell again. He was an outspoken, self-confident, egocentric, narcissistic asshole who wore a floor-length coat no matter the weather and had the audacity to tell her when he thought her boyfriends weren't up to his ridiculously high standards (no matter that she had never seen hide nor hair of a female (or a male?) ever enter _his_ flat). In fact, if she had to hazard a guess, she would have said he had no close friends and, no, that did not drum up any sympathy for him - served him right, the bastard. 

Their feud went on for longer than anyone at Powell cared to remember. If some hapless bystander was asked to choose sides, well, the Super was used to people pulling fire alarms to avoid a John and Rose confrontation. Until the night the fire alarm went off for real sometime after midnight and everyone was standing around helplessly while flames spurted out of the east balcony windows. Somehow in the midst of the panic the shout went up that Rose was nowhere to be seen and John went ballistic. Several people tried to hold him back as he charged for the doors, but he ducked under the firefighter's arms and disappeared into the burning building.

Thanking every deity he could remember that their flats were on the west side of the building, John charged up the five flights of stairs, his mind flashing neon images of his dead parents and blackened shell of a childhood home. He didn't bother knocking, slamming into her door until the hinges broke and racing through her flat shouting her name. She was asleep, exhausted after a long week of work, and not terribly pleased to see him when he picked her up and started carrying her out of the flat. When they reached the hallway, they discovered the flames were crackling ever close and when he closed his hand around hers and hollered "Run" she didn't hesitate, keeping pace with his long-legged stride until they reached the fresh air.

The firefighters were less than pleased with John, but properly proud of him for rescuing Rose and the neighbors were too in awe of the tentative peace to comment on the fact that they never dropped hands. And, as they stood together, watching Powell burn to the ground, John wrapped an arm around Rose, pulling her close and she never resisted, resting her head on his shoulder and staring at the roaring flames in disbelief. When the smoke cleared there wasn't much left but rubble and as the shocked tenants tried to sort out what they were going to do, it seemed the most natural thing in the world for John to turn to Rose and suggest she come with him and for her to follow him to his battered blue truck and ride off into the night.

There are two things that every resident of Powell Apartment Complex knows. One: the Super lost a lot of money when he installed faulty wiring and two: John Smith and Rose Tyler never moved back in when it was rebuilt. In fact, no one who lived there ever spoke to them again. There were rumors, of course, and sightings. When Lynda Moss came back from her vacation to Spain she swore she saw them eating at a cafe and Luke Rattigan was certain he saw them in Paris, but the stories grew wilder and wilder and eventually John Smith and Rose Tyler became less real people who had once lived there and simply the stuff of legends.


End file.
